There is something that every human loves. It is in our nature, something we long for since we are born and search for until the day we die.
We have a desire to be embraced. We see this in babies and children, and as we grow older, we try to find this desire through many different things. We try to find it in relationships, sports, success, grades, etc. We try to fulfill the desire to be embraced but we often fail.
We can taste what this embrace feels like and at times, experience glimpses of it, but we never fully feel it.
There is only one person who can embrace us and make us feel fully embraced. And that is our Father God.
We see this embrace in the parable of the Prodigal Son in Luke 15:11-32. We see the father run out and embrace his son, welcoming him home after the son had rebelled and gone against the father. The son came home looking for food but he was met by the warm, loving embrace of his father.
This is what we all want in life. To be embraced and feel the love of the people who love us and care about us the most.
In this past semester of college, I had the pleasure of reading a book called "Return of the Prodigal Son" by Henri Nouwen. This book is Nouwen's reflections on a painting by Rembrandt.
In this painting, we see the younger son returning and being embraced by his father as he returns broken, lost, on his last straw and ready to be welcomed into the embrace of his father.
In Nouwen's story, he reflects on his experience while he looked at the painting and relating to the different characters in the story.
To me, the most impactful part of Nouwen's book was when he talked about his experience as the younger son and shares a personal story about the times he had felt lost in his life.
"I wanted to be embraced; I was looking for a home where I could feel safe. The son-come-home was all I was and all that I wanted to be. For so long I had been going from place to place; confronting, beseech if, admonishing, and consoling. Now I desired only to rest safely in a place where I could feel a sense of belonging, a place where I could feel at home."
This feeling is what everyone wants. Everyone wants to feel at home. And this is the feeling of welcome God can offer us. But we can catch glimpses of it in our everyday life.
That happened to me earlier this past semester and it was something that surprised me but made me feel warm inside and blessed.
I had the chance to give a friend of mine a birthday present. When I gave her the present she was so excited she started screaming and she gave me one of the best hugs I had ever been given. In it I could feel the love from our friendship and the memories we have shared. As we squeezed each other out of happiness and joy, I felt calm and at peace; I felt protected and loved.
Later that night, I was reading "The Return of the Prodigal Son." This section that I was reading about was talking about Nouwen's first looks at the painting and seeing the father embracing his lost son who had returned. Reading about this embrace made me tear up. Since what we all want is to feel that embrace, and I felt that embrace earlier that night.
The embrace of love and compassion that we only feel from the people that love the most deeply in life.
This embrace is what everyone wants. Deep down we want to feel love this way. We search for it in the wrong places and they will fall short of leaving us feeling loved and embraced. Only God can give us this embrace we long for.
The more I read the parable of the Prodigal Son, the more I see how this parable reflects God's relationship with us. We are lost sons and daughters of God who are yearning to feel his embrace. When we come to God as his children and he welcomes us in, that is when we feel his love and feel complete with his embrace of love and warmth.
The people God has put around us can give us a glimpse of this warmth through hugs, moments when they shower us in love, times where they go out of their way to care about us and make us feel that we matter. These glimpses make me hopeful for the day where I can enter into God's embrace and fully feel his love and warmth.
